 "Nikhil Ganju")
Consumer behaviour shows that even as consumers are using mobile to conduct their research for booking they are still going back to larger form factors, Nikhil Ganju tells Sangeeta Tanwar
How and in what ways has the online travel business changed since the launch of TripAdvisor India in 2008?
At the time we entered the market, OTAs (online travel agencies) were still not focussed on online accommodation as they were mostly selling flight tickets. This has changed over the years with OTAs growing focus on listing hotel inventory and providing content on accommodation. Back then lack of information on accommodation was an issue. However, OTAs have since stepped in and got on board a large number of unlisted and unbranded independent hotels which are not affiliated to a particular big hotel chain. And lastly, mobile has added a significant impact and it will continue to have a significant impact on the online travel business. Today, more and more hotel and travel shoppers are attracted to research online. For the vast majority of travel shoppers the research starts online. Whether you are buying a travel package, booking a hotel or air ticket, it is safe to assume that a majority of the search starts online. Mobile impacts traveller behaviour in certain ways. For example, it changes the pre-trip behaviour. You can continue your research in a disjointed manner. Also, the social media scenario has undergone a sea change with people freely sharing reviews and photos.
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The biggest challenge right now is the monetisation of mobile. Even as traffic has shifted to mobile it has not resulted in monetisation. Consumer behaviour shows that even as consumers are using mobiles for conducting their research for booking they are still going back to larger form factors, though this behaviour has now started showing signs of change. To accelerate this, OTAs are also offering deep discounts through apps.
At the same time, mobile offers immense opportunities. For TripAdvisor India, use of mobile for discovering and booking attractions and activities is the next big opportunity. Further, knowledge about the on-the-go location of travellers offers a huge opportunity for providing relevant content to users.
Which is the category that brings TripAdvisor India maximum business?
A major chunk of revenues for OTAs will continue to come primarily from hotels, packages, followed by activities, attractions and tours. Currently, it's hotels and packages where the real margins for the industry are. The industry efforts are focussed on driving transactions through online by offering heavy discounts.
Over the last two years, all the advertising that OTAs have done is focussed on pushing hotel bookings online. At the same time, players are making significant investments in developing and improving the user interface (UI) with an eye on converting a hotel shopper who's not on your site into your customer. Developing a responsive and engaging UI is not a mean task, it requires a lot of data science and human behaviour analysis. The next big area of focus for the online booking and travel websites is cross-selling. OTAs need to continuously look at ways in which they can cross sell different products and services once they get a traveller to visit their site. Players are using enterprise platforms such as customer resource management to increase the prospects of cross-selling. In fact, one of the reasons why a lot of people still have flights listed on their portals is in the hope that may be out of 100 or so people visiting the website at least 20 will end up booking a hotel.
With OTAs stopping budget hotels listing, what is the impact on players like you who rely heavily on meta-search?
Meta-search will continue to be a significant part of the online travel space. The business model that the industry follows is that the branded players take inventory in existing hotels and then sell that under a brand name. With the online travel agencies stopping budget hotels listing, what has happened is that the inventory available with the OTAs has come down. Having said that, for all practical purposes including review of hotels, the OTAs continue to list and sell budget hotels as well. Only a select chunk of inventory is not available to OTAs.
Only time will tell as to who will win this battle involving a business model of the brand and the channel or the traditional OTA model of selling a hotel on its merit. Basically it's the same hotel. And, ultimately to be successful it's the job of any large global OTA to provide the best accommodation choices and the right prices. OTAs have to ensure that their hotel partner is delivering the experience they promise to the consumer.
As a player we work with the ecosystem attracting hotel shoppers agnostically. These developments are interesting and probably a shot in the arm for the industry. For us any happening that accelerates overall growth of online accommodation is a welcome move.
What are the emerging technology trends that will redefine the OTA space?
Players will be leveraging technology to build smarter hotel distribution platforms. Lastly, the combination of real-time contextual awareness, artificial intelligence and wearables will see OTAs playing a bigger role in the traveller's entire journey. Using these technologies, the players will be able to increase the level of their engagement with travellers greatly.
